Forum Discussion
New in Labs: Connected Packages
Connected packages is still in development and will receive updates as part of Labs. Functionality will change over time. Some options could be modified, while others may be removed based on feedback and feature stability. There is no guarantee that Labs experiments will become production features.
The Connected packages feature solves the ages-old headache of keeping your training up to date in your LMS. Now, instead of having to download a fresh package from Rise 360, then uploading it to your LMS every time you make a change, you can deliver updates to your content across LMS environments with just a few clicks.
Connected packages fulfills the dream of publishing once, then dynamically updating your content without re-uploading to your LMS!
Note: Currently, connected packages can only be exported from Rise 360 as SCORM 1.2 and 2004 files.
How to Use Connected Packages
Unlike with standard packages, connected packages let you quickly update your training and notify your learners of changes.
Publishing a Connected Package
Creating a connected package for training content is as simple as creating a standard LMS package.
- Open the content you want to publish from your Rise 360 dashboard. Then click Publish in the upper-right corner of the screen and select LMS.
- Choose an LMS standard. For connected packages, you must select SCORM 2004 or SCORM 1.2 (any edition).
- Select Connected package.
- Toggle the Notify learners option to display a banner to learners when you update the training.
- After selecting any tracking, reporting, and advanced options, click Download.
- Upload the package to your LMS as usual.
Updating a Connected Package
After you’ve published your connected package to your LMS, all future updates happen right in Rise 360.
- When you make changes to your content, an indicator displays on the Publish menu.
- Click either the View Updates button or you can select Connected package from the Publish menu to jump to step 4.
- Select Connected package. If you’ve published your content to Reach 360 or shared with Quick Share, you’ll be able to select those as well.
- Click Update now. Rise handles the rest!
If you toggle or have previously activated the Notify learners option, your learners will see an update banner the next time they refresh or log in to the training.
Note: You can also download a copy of the last-deployed LMS package by clicking Download again.
Notifying Learners of Changes and Resetting Learner Progress
If you update your content and want to notify learners but didn't select the option when you initially published your package, you can enable it when you publish changes.
- In your updated content, click Publish in the upper-right corner of the screen and select LMS.
- Toggle the Notify learners option.
- Click Update now.
With this option enabled, a banner displays for active learners whenever you update the training. Learners who've already completed the training don't receive any notification.
Sometimes, after making updates, you also need to reset learner progress so that active learners don't end up in a blank state when they resume the training. This functionality can now easily be enabled at any time when using connected packages.
- In your updated content, click Publish in the upper-right corner of the screen and select LMS.
- Toggle the Reset progress after updates option.
- Click Update now.
This operates the same as the Reset Learner Progress option in standard packages and does not reset the progress or cancel quiz scores for learners who've already completed the training.
Connected Packages FAQs
When I deploy training to my LMS via Connected Packages, is Articulate the host for my content?
Training deployed to LMS via Connected Packages is hosted on Articulate's systems and is subject to the same security and data policies as other data hosted on the platform, as outlined in our Terms of Service. For additional resources on Articulate's security and data protection, visit our Trust Center.
What content is best suited to connected packages? Is there content I shouldn’t use with connected packages?
Connected packages is best used to deploy content that’s updated frequently or that you plan to iterate on once it’s live.
Since the feature doesn't provide automatic version tracking, we don’t recommend using connected packages with content that requires strict audit trails or enhanced compliance procedures.
Are connected package updates in Rise considered new versions by my LMS?
No, only the files you manually upload to your LMS are considered new versions of the content. Updates you make in Rise are sent to whatever version of the file is currently uploaded to your LMS.
In which regional data center does my content reside?
While regional hosting isn't a consideration at this stage of development, Connected Packages should be available in your regional hosting location when launched for general availability.
What happens when I delete training in Rise that's been deployed using connected packages? Will training work in my LMS if I turn off the Labs feature?
Content deleted from your Rise dashboard will still function in your LMS until you permanently delete the source training. You’ll be able to restore it from the trash and continue to update via Connected Packages without manually uploading a new package to your LMS. When permanently deleted, the connected package is also deleted.
If you disable the Labs feature, all connected packages are deactivated and deleted, but the source content remains untouched.
Permanently deleting associated Rise content or disabling Labs, will cause the training in your LMS to stop functioning. To restore, manually upload a standard package as a new version of the same training.
Can I use the same troubleshooting steps with Connected Packages as I do with Standard Packages?
Yes, while your content is hosted by Articulate, the same troubleshooting steps, such as resetting learner progress and hiding the LMS interface, can still be applied as detailed in the Rise 360 user guide.
Do Connected Packages send information to Articulate from my LMS?
While the Connected Packages feature is in Labs, we use a third-party data subprocessor, Datadog, to track certain information in order to identify and debug issues as they arise. In particular: Course ID, Learner ID (based on the Subscription ID plus an LMS Learner ID, if one is returned by the LMS), and your subscription ID. This information is not captured for every Connected Package.
Additionally, Allow usage data collection is enabled by default for all content exported to an LMS. This option provides Articulate with the course ID launched and non-identifiable learner usage data, as shown in our data collection details. It can be disabled on a per-package basis.
If I collaborate with other creators, can they update training deployed to my LMS?
Only content owners and collaborator managers with the feature enabled can send training updates via Connected Packages.
Can I download packages after initially publishing via connected packages?
Yes. There’s a Download button at the top of the LMS publish screen. Keep in mind that you have access only to the last-deployed version of the package.
Will connected packages be available for other LMS export standards? Is it coming to Storyline 360?
We would love to hear your feedback on what export format you’d like to see next for Connected Packages! And while Storyline support isn’t planned at this time, if it’s something you’d like to see, please let us know.
Share Your Feedback
For this initial Labs release, we want to hear how connected packages perform across real LMS environments and whether the experience feels as intuitive. Your feedback will directly influence development, so consider sharing your thoughts on the following topics:
- Uses: Does the "publish once, update anytime" workflow sync with how you manage training content?
- Bugs. Is anything not working as expected? Do the updates behave as you’d expect with your specific LMS setup?
- Improvements. How could this feature be better? What changes, if any, would you like to see?
- Insights. How does this new publish-to-update workflow fit into your day-to-day?
You can enable and disable this feature from the Labs page in account settings. Share your thoughts in this Labs forum or use the feedback form directly within the feature.
237 Replies
I’ve submitted several support tickets about the 404 error message upon exiting the course when using connected packages. Maybe I’ll have better luck getting some help with this in the forum. LMS is Absorb.
Kathyksigstadon We've rolled out a fix to the exit issue you reported, would you be willing to give this a fresh try and let me know how it goes?
Yes indeed, I can confirm that the 404 error has gone away. Fantastic news! Thank you!😀
Kathyksigstadon I've been following this issue since it's also happening to us - we use Docebo. It's only if you add the "Exit Course" button when publishing the SCORM that we see the issue. Since our Docebo course player already has an exit button, I've disabled Rise's Exit Course button and then there's no 404 errors 😊
Sorry you've been running into this and sorry the support tickets haven't gotten you to a resolution faster.
This is a known bug and it's not specific to Absorb; we've seen it across multiple LMSs. The fix is in our development queue, and once it ships, you'll need to redownload the package from Rise and re-upload it to Absorb to get the corrected version.
We've noticed that if you are updating a connected course package and you have other Rise courses open, it seems to redirect all the open Rise courses to the course that you have just updated. You have to close them all and start over and update them one-by-one to avoid this happening.
Hello MITOLearningDes,
Thanks for flagging this and for the detailed description. That's helpful to know!
When you say other Rise courses are "open," do you mean multiple browser tabs? That context will help us better understand what you're experiencing.
Yes sorry, when there are other browser tabs open with Rise courses/modules, these become the course that was just updated via a connected package. It does not affect other browser tabs that are not Rise related.
So far this has worked well for the most part, with a few expected glitches but overall it's a great addition. One thing that seems to cause an issue for me, is that I cannot download the packages that have been published on the LMS, the download button just does nothing. I don't know if it's a temporary bug or not but it's a problem, because I wanted to make another course from scratch and I no longer have the original files.
Hello SpirosZoumperis,
Great call opening a support case. I see that you're working with my colleague Genelyn. You're in excellent hands! We'll continue the conversation in your case, so everything is in one spot.
Thanks Luciana.
Thanks for the comment. It seems I found a quick workaround for now, so in case any one else has this issue I will post it below:
It looks like the issue stems from the language formatting. I was using Greek characters for the titles of my courses and some of them seem to cause that non-download thingy (only for the connected packages option).
Renaming the course to something else (preferably in standard English) will allow the download and, once you have the zip file, you can go back to changing the name to whatever you like. It will auto update once the user opens the course in the LMS.
Game changer
So glad you think so, RobGibson-25619!
Question: How long does it take for the changes to show up in the LMS?
Hello MichaelWest!
Great question! Updates are applied almost immediately after you click Update Now in Rise. Learners will see the updated content the next time they relaunch or refresh the course, with no waiting period on our end.
That said, if your LMS caches content, there may be a brief delay depending on how your LMS handles that. If you're not seeing updates right away, it's worth checking your LMS cache settings.
Let us know how it goes!
I’m so happy this feature was released- it’s a game changer, and I truly hope it’s here to stay 🎉
Hello OfriSheferGilat!
We're so glad to hear your excitement for Connected Packages! Feel free to share your feedback on this experiment in our feedback form. 🎉
We're messing with this in our LMS and the "Exit Course" button keeps giving us an error. I'm not sure if it's an "us" thing or if it's one of the bugs that the beta test is working out.
I have screenshots and LMS information if you'd like me to email.
ecahill Thanks for flagging this here and in the feedback form. We've shipped a fix for the exit button error. I sent you the details by email too, but for anyone else following along: make a small change to your course, click Update on the existing connected package, then Download Package again and re-upload it to your LMS. Let us know how it goes!
Saw the form and filled it out. :)
Excellent! Thanks for sharing additional information with us, ecahill!
Hello,
I think this new feature is fantastic and really will speed things up for us. Having tested & deployed a few of these connected files some users are reporting issues accessing the content. Guessing this will be an IT security thing but wanted to see if anyone else had encountered this and point me in the right direction? We are using SAP SuccessFactors LSM.
Thanks,
Jody
Hello JodyMcGurk-f5dc,
Glad it's working well for you! You're right that this looks like a network configuration issue on your end rather than a problem with Connected Packages itself.
We'd recommend sharing this article with your IT team as a starting point, it outlines the network endpoints that need to be allowlisted for Articulate 360 to work properly.
Let us know if you run into anything else!
Question: once published as a conncected package, is there a possibility to recreate a (connected) SCORM? Example: I created a connected SCORM for client A, and some time later client B want the same course, which has already been updated a few times since creation. Or can I send the original SCORM and they will immediately see all the updates?
Great question, OpforArticulate ! Yes, you can absolutely create a separate Connected Package for Client B.
The best approach is to duplicate the course in your Rise 360 dashboard, then publish a brand-new Connected Package from that copy. This gives Client B their own independent connected package, completely separate from Client A's, so updates you push for one won't affect the other.
As for sending the original SCORM file to Client B: that won't work the way you might hope. The original file is tied to Client A's connected package instance, so Client B would receive Client A's updates, and you'd have no way to manage them independently. A fresh duplicate and a new export is definitely the cleaner path.
Let us know if you run into anything as you set that up!
Thank you LucianaPiazza for this explanation.
Actually, both clients *should* have the same updates :-) So I'm going to go forward with the original SCORM and keep people posted here (still have to test things with client B)
Good morning! The FAQ says "If you disable the Labs feature, all connected packages are deactivated and deleted, but the source content remains untouched." What happens if the employee who created the connected SCORM in RISE leaves the company, and their Articulate license is deleted or transferred? Will the connected SCORM they loaded into our LMS still function, or will it be deactivated and deleted?
Hello RonBriscoe!
Great question, and an important one for teams to plan around.When a seat is removed or transferred, course ownership is reassigned to another member of the subscription, it doesn't get deleted along with the seat. So as long as your organization's Articulate 360 subscription remains active and the course is transferred to an active seat holder, the Connected Package in your LMS will continue to function without interruption.
The scenario to watch out for is if the entire subscription is canceled or lapses. In that case, content hosted on Articulate's servers, including Connected Packages, would be deactivated. That's the same behavior referenced in the FAQ you cited.
Our recommendation: make sure courses tied to Connected Packages are owned by a shared or admin-level account rather than an individual's personal seat, so there's no disruption if someone leaves the team.
Hope that helps clarify things!
